Monthly-ish Personal Update (Oct 2020)

Hi, this is my monthly-ish personal update to my most valued friends and allies. More info here. Guilt-free unsubscribe link at the bottom.

Here are three updates:

First, overcoming anxiety.

For several months, I felt very anxious. I struggled to get to work every day. I resisted working on personal projects. I think I even took every Friday off for 4 weeks in a row... It's probably Coronavirus-induced isolation. I am not sure.

But finally, on 3. Oct 2020, I noticed and wrote "The chronic sinking feeling in my stomach and the tightness in my chest and shoulders are gone."

Some things I did that helped (I think):

• I reduced my caffeine intake and only drink 2 cups of coffee (one upon waking and one after lunch) per day.
• I became more conscious of and started managing my PMS by drinking Magnesium, Calcium, and D3 everyday 14 days prior to my period.
• I drink Ginkgo, Zinc, and B-vitamins everyday.

The above is my distillation of actionables from The Anxiety and Phobia Workbook, which I also highly recommend.

Second, Coaching Project, now aka "Gen Propel"

My friend Jezze and I now have a name for Coaching Project: Generation Propel. Find our online home here: http://genpropel.com/

Our goal is to offer coaching that helps solve challenges East Asians experience when working in multi-cultural environments.

Our theory: When encountering common career challenges such as: applying for jobs to move to a new country, overcoming imposter syndrome, or managing people for the first time... Certain cultural traits such as, say, deference to elders / authority or lack of assertiveness, make these even more challenging for us than they already are.

My next step: Offer free coaching! I'd like to find 1 or 2 people for whom the above resonates and work with them for several weeks to identify and help solve their top related challenges.

I've helped friends advance in their careers, but now I'd like to extract a more structured approach for this. Would you know anyone who might be interested? :)

Third, learning German.

I've been learning learning German on my own for almost 1 year. I'm currently on A2 Level. Yesterday, I finally felt ready to put a bit more pressure on speeding up this process. I coughed up EUR 229 and signed up to take the exam for a Goethe-Zertifikat B1 on 16. Dec 2020. Wish me luck!

Oh, and if you're curious, the tools and process I use for this is:

• Listen to Rocket German and add all conversation snippets as flashcards to Anki.
• Take 2-3 Lingoda classes every week. These are like in-person classes: Live. A real teacher. 2 to 5 students. Very active participation. …except it’s online. I use these more for social accountability and speaking practice. (Feel free to use my referral code to get a 50 EUR discount: ejawmt)
• Watch Netflix in German audio and English subtitles. (I’m on Season 3 Episode 10 of Vampire Diaries. Don’t laugh!!)

That's it! Know anyone who would be interested in getting free coaching from me? Otherwise, what's exciting for you these days?

Hit reply. I'd love to hear from you.

Thanks,
Chiara